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Questionable remedial potential of global communications
Time for a Remedial Global Nuclear War? (Part #4)
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The case for a remedial nuclear war can be called into question in the light of the optimistic expectations so widely promoted with respect to global communication, the internet, and artificial intelligence. Remedial potential is readily associated with the anticipated developments with arguments to the contrary readily dismissed.
There is however a case for exploring the possibility, if not the probability, that the global communication system will collapse of its own accord in the light of evident difficulties to which attention has been variously drawn. It is therefore questionable whether its processes can provide the safety-net expected of it. An earlier exercise considered the challenges in terms of the collective capacity to process the volume and variety of information critical to global governance (Imminent Collective Communication "Info-death"? 2018). This distinguished the following issues:
Since that time, a point to be emphasized is that irrespective of the potential physical violence indicated above -- and the opposition to it -- global communications are now a context not only for information warfare, but also for memetic warfare and cognitive warfare. The "pro-war" and "anti-war" constituencies are especially active in these. It is unclear that any form of "peace" is to be engendered in consequence, whether transcendent or otherwise.
Global communication possibilities are then to be understood as being as much a part of the problem as of any remedial potential. Whereas they can indeed be understood as offering possibilities of transformative paradigm shifts in response to global fragmentation, it is equally clear that their manipulative use reinforces such fracturing to an ever greater degree. Especially problematic in this respect is the use of global communication to craft a "mainstream" dominant narrative such as to marginalize and repress alternative perspectives. Such crafting is notably significant in the manner in which ensures both the negligence of critical issues and a distractive focus on secondary or trivial issues (Vigorous Application of Derivative Thinking to Derivative Problems, 2013).
Never in the history of humankind has there been so much "dialogue" to so little long-term benefit -- and with so little effort to explore the nature of such failure, relative to the challenges such dialogue claims to address.
Especially noteworthy as failures of integrative global communication are international dialogue, interdisciplinary dialogue, interfaith dialogue, intercultural dialogue -- in the light of the difficulties highlighted in each case. Proponents of each naturally emphasize progress made, avoiding reference to its inadequacy in relation to the challenges they might otherwise be expected to address.
Of particular relevance at this time is the degree to which integrative communication has been sacrificed in the name of support for the proxy war between NATO and Russia in Ukraine. This can be interpreted as an act of lobotomy avoiding the potential of meta-discourse, as argued separately (Severing the Russian Hemisphere as Problematic Global Lobotomy? 2022). It could be understood as deriving from the simple biblical notion: And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee (Matthew 19:9). The biblical injunction continues with the more questionable comment: It is better for thee to enter into life with one eye, rather than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire. The difficulty is that in order to navigate the complex crises of the times, at least two eyes are required for focusing capaxity and depth perception (John A. T. Robinson, Truth is Two-eyed, 1979; Albert Marshall, Two-Eyed Seeing, Institute for Integrative Science and Health, 1974).
Framed in that way it then becomes questionable as to what might be understood as a "global brain" and its efficacy in response to the challenges of global governance. Given the multidimensional nature of the complex of problems, the integration of a multiplicity of perspectives may be assumed to be required -- rather than two (Interrelating Multiple Ways of Looking at a Crisis, 2021). Rather than being simply distinctive, there may be a further requirement that they be disparate to the point of being necessarily incommensurable (Dynamics of N-fold Integration of Disparate Cognitive Modalities, 2021).
In the light of brain metaphor, the question may be locating the integrative function within the world wide web (Corpus Callosum of the Global Brain? 2014). Does reflection on the nature of any "global brain" extend beyond the problematic competition between intelligence agencies and their surveillance capacity (Envisaging a Comprehensible Global Brain -- as a Playful Organ, 2019). More problematic is the provocative question: Are the UN and the International Community both Brain Dead (2019). Does the desperate quest for extraterrestrial intelligence ignore the terrifying possibility of the lack of intelligence on Earth (Quest for Intelligent Life on Earth -- from a Future Perspective, 2023) ?
The possibility of integrative insight into the challenges of global governance is further undermined by the manner in which a very limited number of multinational corporations own and control the content of those academic journals deemed to be "high impact". This complements a similar pattern of ownership of the major news media rendering highly questionable the critical capacity of the mainstream narrative they collectively craft. This suggests a dangerous vulnerability to global group think, silo thinking and conceptual cartels.
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